THE NEED FOR AND DEVELOPMENT OF AN AP GEOLOGY COURSE

Students take AP courses with the expectation that if they do well, their college applications will be viewed favorably, and they will earn college credit or place out of introductory courses. Top students take APs, and college counselors discourage our best science students from taking courses that are not APs. Even if a rigorous, advanced geoscience course is offered in high school, students tend not enroll because it lacks the AP prestige. When earth science is offered to 9th grade students, often the top performing students are allowed to bypass it to take high school biology. If the only exposure students have to the earth sciences is in 7th or 8th grade (if there is any exposure at all), they're unlikely to consider serious study of the earth sciences in college. Presently, our educational system is not attracting enough students into careers in the geosciences, although there are ten times as many jobs/student available in the geosciences as in biology. During the summer of 2000, the authors undertook to convince the College Board to develop an AP Geology course and exam. The decision to create a physical geology course (rather than a broader earth science course) is based on two important considerations. We wish to avoid creating a course that is "a mile wide and an inch deep", and the course must meet the College Board's criteria to be similar to common undergraduate courses. In September, 2000, the authors, with the support of representatives of GSA, AGI, and NAGT, met with the president of the College Board to present our proposal. That proposal was well received, and if high school teachers express an interest in teaching AP Geology, we will move ahead with the development of the course. Since January, 2001, College Board has been conducting an online interest survey at http://www.collegeboard.org/ap/. We need and continue to seek the support, interest, and involvement of secondary and college faculty.